This is a sermon I gave on Sunday Aug. 20 in Oslo, Norway at Kulturkirken Jakob (St. James Church of Culture). Actor and film director Liv Ullmann read the scripture passages.
In middle age, I became an agnostic but before that I went sometimes to the church and I wished that someone had delivered a sermon like this. It would have not changed my perception of theology but I'm sure the world would have been quite different from what is now. Thank you, Mr. Hedges
Wow. I have given up on metaphysics in favor of humanism, but that resonates. Thank you, Chris. You are also a wild man prophet shouting apropos warnings in the wilderness. I hope you find peace and satisfaction in your selfless efforts for humanity.
Great sermon, Chris!! I wish I could have been there to hear it.
The way you go through the dynamics of Assange's persecution is sublime.
The American Empire is collapsing and our corporate masters are desperate to stop anyone who challenges or questions the approved narrative. Right now the collapse is moving kinda slowly, but like so many existential issues that start out slowly, it can get really fast, really quickly.
I was hoping someone would compare Julian's situation to Jesus Christ without it sounding absurd. This article is outstanding and historic, a truly great work. Thank you.
In America you call it the separation of church and state.
I subscribe to Quebec's Co-op of independent journalists. We are a small demographic of Latinos smaller than many of your largest states.
Quebec is a different culture and speaks a different language. In Quebec Bernie Sanders is a centrist maybe a wee bit on the right. In Quebec Churches and Corporation have no rights. They are pieces of paper not living things. Only life has rights in Quebec and human life begins at birth and ends with death.
A fetus is not a living human until it emerges from a womb and doctor assisted suicide is part of healthcare.
I trust my local daily to tell me what it sees. I trust Chris Hedges to tell me what he sees. I see what I see. "perception is real in its consequences." Voltaire
I remember a Quebec that was poor and largely illiterate but it looked like Latin America looks today.
Today we pity America when I grew up we were jealous of America.
We used to padlock libraries now we send our working class to university.
We call it Secular humanist liberal democracy.
We love the system but evolution is happening way to quickly and we need college grads who know how to clean hospital floors. Cleaning hospital floors is a middle class job and requires a middle class education and the job requires a middle class salary. Our Amazon workers can send their children to university pay a mortgage and feed their families.
Julian Assange is a hero in Quebec . He is welcome to live anywhere in Quebec and stay as long as he wants.
You are very fortunate to live in such a culture. Here in the US our corporate masters are insisting we can't even talk about the kind of humanism Quebec seems to be practicing, and the Christians seem to have forgotten the Sermon on the Mount.
Costa Rica maybe the only secular humanist liberal democracy in the Americas. I often wonder if Montreal lost its baseball team because we are a secular state and a liberal democracy and very wealthy. When we were a European theocracy/plutocracy we were poor and illiterate. More importantly we went from hopelessness for a better future which I call conservatism to liberalism which is about the future.
Education up to post docs is affordable for everyone even uber drivers.
Hope is all that remains in Pandora's Jar and America bought conservative Snake oil.
I don't know about the Montreal team, but some other sports teams have changed locations because the city or state wouldn't give them the money they wanted to build a new stadium.
Very interesting about Costa Rica. I know very little about your country, but IIRC it's a good place for American ex-pats. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Higher education here has become a sinecure for administrators and managers. Ever since the MBA's started taking over the colleges and universities about 40 years ago, the increase in tuition is almost entirely due to increased salaries for the administrators rather than for the folks who do the actual teaching. Sad.
I live in Quebec not Costa Rica and we are incredibly wealthy after being run by tyrants for 400 years. Our Health, education and welfare is run by our local university and the universities are run by ethical philosophers.
In America where I lived for decades your hierarchy has always taught the you the working class could not run your society it was always thus long before Columbus it is called conservatism in Johnson's dictionary of the English Language 1755.
Jefferson believed all men are created equal and Ben Franklin was a peasant who never went to school. Franklin taught himself to read and write and believed in educating everyone . Franklin built public libraries and public schools. His writing made him a celebrity and millionaire. He even bought slaves and then one day on the road to Damascus he became an extreme abolitionist and today we call it rocket science but Franklin developed the storage battery.
In our democracy the government doesn't rule it serves. Our administrators administrate just like in corporate America but we the people are ownership not management.
Our society is run by ethical philosophers who are paid salaries to administer to our desires.
Institutions have no rights only the privilege we choose to grant them.
Churches, Corporations, NGOs and even the government has no rights we grant human beings and living things. Institutions are pieces of paper they are not people in Quebec. English speaking Canada has many of the same laws but Bill 21 says in Quebec the SEPARATION BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE IS INVIOLATE.
Inviolate In Quebec keeping church and state separate is a sacred trust
The only guarantee of Freedom of Religion is Freedom from religion.
The American constitution is violation of the commandment against serving false idols. Jefferson wanted a new constitution written for every generation. In Quebec if the constitution no longer is deemed appropriate it is discarded.
In 1776 they believed a lot of stuff we now know is nonsense.
In Canada CORPORATIONS ARE PIECES OF PAPER THEY ARE NOT PEOPLE.
I am an old citizen but when I go to court the court is there to serve me as its boss not its slave. Both the defense and the prosecution are there to serve truth and justice and are not competitors but allies in the search for truth and justice.
In Quebec the constitution is a piece of paper. It is an instruction manual and assembly instructions not orders from the Almighty.
We are a secular Humanist liberal democracy that borders an Empire.. Our only defense is speaking a language that isn't NEWSPEAK.
There is no room for cars in downtown Montreal it was built for horses not suburbs.
I love watching baseball but when our Quebec Prime Minister said ROMAN CATHOLISM WASN'T ALL BAD MANY OF US CALLED FOR HIS RESIGNATION. iN QUEBEC RELIGION IS KEPT IN THE CLOSET SO PEOPLE CAN ENJOY THE SUNLIGHT.
For Jefferson, slavery was magic; particularly if the enslaved bore children. He actually referred to this magic originally referenced in Aesops Fable #Aesop's Fable 87: The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs (origin approx 600 B.C.)--an ancient greek fable Jefferson was surely familiar with. He is quoted in a letter from Elizabeth Trist to Catharine Wistar Bache (Dec.28,1810) as giving advice to a relative against selling slaves by saying "it wou'd never do to destroy the goose". In fact, Jefferson wrote to President George Washington as early as 1792 on his infamous "4% " slavery investment calculation. He wrote "I allow nothing for losses by death, but, on the contrary, shall presently take credit four per cent, per annum, for their increase over and above keeping up their own numbers". Indeed, Henry Wiencek writes in his book on Jefferson titled "Master of the Mountain" that "The words Jefferson used-"their increase"-became magic words".
I am a grandfather of Americans. When you grow up in privilege your empathy is diminished by your privilege. It is the way it was and the way it is.
Jefferson wrote or assembled his American Bible in 1820. The Life and Moral of Jesus of Nazareth. He was a former president not a student of The College of William and Mary and the Toleraration Act of 1689.
'Toleration is not the message of Jesus of Nazareth.
The fact you never grow up doesn't mean everybody is Peter Pan.
I lived in Woodlawn for over a decade. I would walk through the campus of the University of Chicago and my dog would not join the other dogs in jumping in fountain in front of the law school. All the law students loved my dog and their professor Obama.
I always spoke to them as peers but they were children and didn't believe they would ever grow up.
These are your leaders. These have always been OUR leaders from the time we built the first cities.
Jefferson was a scientist not a lawyer. We never allow truth tellers to assume authority we prefer Never Neverlanders. Science is the study of EVOLUTION.
Quebec is governed by our ethical philosophers not our juvenile delinquents.
I grew up under laws that allowed the government to padlock Jewish libraries and union halls where if you wanted to go to heaven you listened to mommy and daddy and GOD.
Jefferson grew up by 1820 he already been Daddy and was leaving forever.
Jefferson was flawed as are we all. We believe lots things that ain't just what we would like them to be.
I only vote in Canada but my wife supported Obama. when he entered our politics. I would prefer a liberal but in America liberal is like being Satan incarnate. Obama is a neoliberal and as Canadian philosopher John Ralston Saul says neoliberalism is neither new nor liberal.. Obama is a conservative. You can't always get what you want but if you try sometimes you get what you need.
In case you are wondering I( am not college material I couldn't do public school but I love building libraries.
Thomas More wrote Utopia it means a place of the imagination.
In Montreal the Thomas More Institute is a liberal arts institute dedicated to life long learning.
In America the Thomas More Society is a organization of right wing Roman Catholic legal juvenile delinquents dedicated to life long childhood.
I know the University of Chicago it has some brilliant students and faculty and a heck of a lot of Peter Pans and his children that never grow up.
I am a Jew my father grew up in Poland. He went to Catholic High School he understood Peter Pan.
I know what the constitution means. I have Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language. Johnson was a conservative and was a leading intellectual of the council of Never Neverland.
The words used in the constitution have evolved and the constitution is an abomination in 2023.
Raskin and Obama are experts in the America's constitution and have not got the curiosity to understand the words. I like them both but I love children who refuse to grow up. I still love my dog he is buried in my backyard. He lived a an interesting life. He was an old dog when he died. We were playing frisbee and he was playing with the deer the day he died. I am over six foot and he was still catching frisbees well above my head.
We played frisbee every day but I was not 75.
My wife studied philosophy at The University of Chicago. She has a PhD
We are retired and spend our dotage studying philosophy and we spend more on books than we do on groceries and we have no mortgage and our pensions cover our expenses.
We the richest humans in history in Never NeverLand.
Our grandson went to the same School as Michelle Obama and I was a forced to attend the same English Protestant Schools as Kamala Harris and we are not English Protestants we are liberals.
We are liberals. Evolution is God's design for the universe.
My wife's expertise is training teachers not from "Christian" culture to understand their cultures are as valuable as those from Rome, san Francisco, Washington, Ottawa, Moscow or London.
I learned to write after we left Chicago and I am just starting to write for children. Children like Elon Musk and people with college degrees like Joseph Robinette Biden and Chris Hedges.
I studied scripture all my life it is allegory not reality.
Jefferson evolved he tried to build a better society. He wrote The Life and morals of Jesus of Nazareth and read and studied Torah and Koran. He didn't believe in stone tablets he knew they crumbled into dust. He called it The American Bible.
My muse was a PhD in education and a Buddhist monk he told me I needed to learn to write for children before he left this vale of tears.
Writing wasn't easy before I learned how to operate an autistic keyboard designed for 5 year olds.
Writing is still a Herculean task for me but it is what I most enjoy before I crumble into dust.
I was a professional photographer I didn't need to know how to write. I am an old man blind in one eye and adjusting to failing eyesight and learning what being human is all about.
Thank-you, dear Christopher Hedges - for this speech in defence of my brave and incorruptible fellow countryman, Julian Assange as well as for all others who speak and illuminate the truth in the face of the abuse of power of those who rule - who rule not wisely nor with compassion but who rule to reap the profits of inhumanity and illegality - against the truth. I shall spread this far and wide...
Vote for nobody because the system isn't reformable and the CIA would kill anyone like Vivek or even the Apartheid-lover RFK before they could set foot in the White House, let alone free Julian Assange. Don't waste your time on elections or fall for softhearted naïve reformers who think they can change the system through it, because it cannot be saved and it must be destroyed along with those who control it. The system's ability to direct the rebellious into ways of supporting the system, as well as in ways of working for it or making it more efficient, is its neatest trick.
If you want to help Assange, then your best bet is looking for anything you can do outside of a pointless election that can only result in yet another victory for the Demorepublican Party. Protest, especially any kind involving disobedience to the state or leading to civil and political disruption, is your best bet; the worse the disruption, the better. And if you want to be revolutionary, buy land or save to buy land and help your local community while preparing for societal collapse. What is needed is isolated self-sufficient communities that can survive the present technological Dark Age with the goal of trying to ensure, like the monastic communities of old, that everything is not lost to future generations. Having a family or working in a soup kitchen is more revolutionary than wasted time spent on US elections. Without such acts, nothing will matter and all present sacrifices made in the pursuit of truth will not appear to have accomplished anything, because if people don't rebel, only technological tyranny and complete domination awaits.
All you accomplish by voting is legitimising an illegitimate system while pretending you have done anything that results in meaningful change. Of course it's much easier to do than anything substantial.
Vivek and Trump are the only two outsiders without previous government experience. Well Trump has it now, but he is still fighting the establishment you rightly claim is the problem.
If Trump wins there will be a civil war... and it will be ugly but I suspect the people would prevail.
Seems letting the old Confederacy go might be great. Let their residents deal with the low wages, inferior education, and poor healthcare. Except that the poorest people, particularly BIPOC, could not afford to vote with their feet. And all Indian treaties within their states would be immediately null and void. Corporate interests would grab everything. Native peoples are who they are because of the land to which they are intimately connected; stripping that away entirely would be an irreparable horror.
Hedges calls for "constant acts of mass civil disobedience..." He calls for "constant acts of social and political disruption". Really? What civil disobedience? What political disruption? The particulars are glaringly in omission. It appears he desperately wants to be a leader to free his friend, Julian Assange from Belmarsh prison, but he doesn't know how to lead. Leadership means organizing and calling for specific action. He does neither. Rather, he chooses to hide behind the safety of the religious cloak by staying on the safe side of the law that guarantees expression of religious freedom. Indeed, upon his shield he writes words of religious expression (indeed copied from many others) which involve no social disruption; no civil disobedience whatsoever. He safely writes "pick up the cross and bear its awful weight on our back". Whatever. We've heard you utter these words before. This was, at best, a better draft.
I can only surmise that Hedges prefers to make Julian Assange out to be a prophet so he can safely (and legally) hide behind religious ideology that keeps him legally protected in the U.S.--and obfuscates the issue. In shorts he wants to start a revolution on religious grounds when there are none to stand on. This is totally unnecessary and futile. To the contrary, I believe Julian Assange simply discovered illegal activity in an erstwhile civil society--and worked unflinchingly to expose it under the power of the Press. No prophet connotations were needed. This is a civil matter to be resolved civilly. Martin Luther King did this (with the civil right matters of his day) by organizing marches, promoting sit ins, etc. Boycotts and petitions have also been effective civil means of protest. Nonetheless, King did his part most effectively by being a leader on the street, not a preacher in the pulpit. I suggest Hedges start offering similar civil solutions in order to address Julian's illegal prosecution-- if he really wants to be similarly effective.
By the sound of it, you're just another soulless nihilist who wants to be told what to do because you're already dead from no belief. Try going to a protest or even reading about them before you act like others are doing nothing while asking questions like "what disruption?". You act like Hedges isn't active in street protest. Are you? And what have you done for Assange? Other than attack people doing way more than you are for not doing it the way you like while defending states ran by the worst mass murderers of history as being civil and reformable. You come across as yet another dime-a-dozen Internet know-it-all trying to tell others what's politically effective while having nothing to say, doing nothing useful, and believing in nothing. Yawn.
Besides the implied narrow definitions of civil disobedience and political disruption, you've proclaimed that "leadership means organizing and calling for specific action." So then are you going to show us exactly what that means? Or remain just another sedentary critic?
Your words deny any role to angry artists and musicians calling for justice. Or to alternative philosophers and economists. Or journalists. Even mystics have a part; prior to any action is the vision of what could be.
You seem to misunderstand what "prophet" means theologically, which Hedges explained in detail. Prophets don't work well with established power; they speak the truth no matter the danger to themselves. Therefore it's not about being "civil"--meaning to be polite and to work within the established order. Consider instead the feminist adage that "well-behaved women seldom make history."
You may believe that MLK was best on the street, not as a preacher. But that ignores the actual history of how he did what he did. As well as the huge role of the Black churches regarding civil rights. Similarly, the overtly religious aspects of the original Populists and the Social Gospel movements, both of which produced real political reforms. Remember, too, the jeremiads of Eugene V. Debs: "Yes, I am my brother's keeper."
Debs is also dear to me for questioning the very notion of leadership. "Too long have the workers waited for some Moses to lead them out of bondage. I would not lead you even if I could. If you can be lead out you can be led back in again...there is nothing you can't do for yourselves." During the '60s, as blue collar (25+ years) and the grandkid of a Wobbly, I would snarl to dogmatic leftists that "vanguard of the working class" was about their sense of superiority, their doubt that we lessers could possibly run our own revolution.
In any event organizing, whether for labor, political campaigns, or civil rights,--all of which I've done--is complex. It's not merely about announcing some action at city center next weekend. it takes months, years, even decades. It starts where people are at and develops over time into relationships built on trust.
I believe the release of Julian Assange, from what I would call false imprisonment, would be a moot point if it is further developed over "decades". Even additional years might but yield the freedom of a corpse. Who said anything about announcing "some action at city center next weekend"...besides yourself? And how would you know if I am sedentary on the issue of Julian Assange? You wouldn't. Small minds yield small thoughts.
BTW, "angry artists and musicians" have not been denied a role in protest for justice under my definition of leadership. They're just as welcome as anyone to participate in any action that leads to the dropping of bogus charges against Julian Assange.
You haven't refuted my points. Re-read my comments; they're based on your assertions about leadership. And about how you simply defined away any role for anything not "civil," including religious organizations.
Since you either didn't understand the implications of your own assertions or didn't like that I called you out on them, I'll be blunt. Your narrow approach isn't going to get Assange his freedom. Worse, since the case is of world-wide importance and will affect freedoms in the U.S. then all opposition needs to be figuring out how to organize for a long, protracted battle. So yeah, "decades." Fortunately for you, some of us have already put in the long years of such work.
If you believe Assange could be released immediately, please explain how. You're the one who defined leadership as "calling for specific action." Where? When? If I'm wrong about how complex organizing is and that it takes trust built over decades, please enlighten us. I'd sure prefer it be easy.
My comment on "sedentary" was meant to link what you seem to think Hedges is about to your belief anyone not acting immediately must be bad somehow. Logically that would include you--unless you can show us differently. That's also why my silly statement about "city center next weekend" because it makes obvious how specificity and immediacy aren't enough.
I included journalists and philosophers since I figured that would demonstrate why your narrow view of leadership not only isn't valid, it's harmful! Not only does it exclude their great contributions, it precludes taking them seriously.
That was also why I mentioned artists and musicians. You then double down down on the original error by proclaiming they're "welcome to participate." So then you really don't see anyone outside of your restrictions as doing anything related to "leadership."
Okay, big mind. Give us some big thoughts. Thoughts that translate into effective immediate actions. Which, if they do, prove my point that vital contributions come in a variety of forms.
It pretty obvious (not to just me, by apparently not to you) that Assange could be released immediately if the U.S. DoJ dropped any and all bogus charges they have levied against him. And you're right, your comments are silly.
Bottom line is that you seem committed to the illusionary idea Hedges spouts that Assange must be assigned the title of Prophet in order to get him freed from jail. What a waste of time and effort doing so, IMO. But it's your religious freedom to believe so...and it's not my responsibility to force you to believe otherwise. Attempting to do so is a pointless debate revolving around religious dogma rooted in a subjective belief systems that does not involve the rule of law. That is why Thomas Jefferson (and others) were adamant about the separation of church and state while drafting our U.S. Constitution*. To be sure, that does not deny ones right to religious freedom, but you won't find any legal argument predicated on an interpretation of The Bible. The human race has been there; done that. It didn't work. So, I'll end my discussion with you by reiterating the familiar saying -- "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make 'em drink."
Cheers friend!
*which legally governs civil society and has (wrongfully, IMO) kept Julian Assange behind bars in Belmarsh Prison. I further believe that a tangent effort to freeing Assange should be a concerted mass effort to repeal the U.S. 1917 Espionage Act. After that, a concerted mass effort to sunset the U.S. Patriot Act. But I digress.
For my 2nd reply, I thought about listing logical fallacies, tactics used especially among right wingers, but indulged in by the center and left, too. Instead, I replied to you by careful argument and precise rebuttals, assuming it's best to take someone seriously on their own terms. That didn't work. So then a list of a few of the logical fallacies you've resorted to.
1.) An irrelevant conclusion, also known as missing the point, is actually one of the fallacies. Bluntly stated: How do you get the U.S. to drop the charges? So if that in reality has little to no chance, then my points about organizing and whom to involve are vital.
2.) Argument by assertion. Your opening comment is full of them--for example your definition of "leadership." I and others have already called you out on this.
3.) Red herring. To drag in unrelated issues so as to deflect from the weakness of an argument and/or to change the subject so to denigrate someone, like you did with Hedges. The part of your original comment, done again here, about religion. It's also a form of guilt by association.
4.) Straw man. Ignoring the best part of an opponent's argument; instead offering your own flimsy version of it and then arguing against that. Your whole diatribe on prophets sure fits. Which is why you ignored my rebuttal (as well as Hedges' extensive explanations) as to the actual meaning of the term. Another is denying any leadership role to MLK's ministry and claiming that he was merely good on civics.
5.) Appeal to the stone. Which means to dismiss another's point as absurd without demonstrating why. Even though in my 2nd comment I explained exactly why I said "city center next weekend" and explicitly called it purposefully "silly," you then open with "your comments are silly." I've expressed forcefully why I think your arguments are inadequate twice and now I'm doing so by formal logic. How about some consideration?
6.) Ad hominem. This one is really bad form--it's to attack the person rather than the argument. Another right wing trope, but also so commonly indulged in that it makes any online discussion nearly impossible. And your "small minds, small thoughts" to me is prime. So also your assertions about Hedge's lack of leadership and that "hide behind religious ideology." Doing ad hominem is to in effect argue that if the person is bad, then so is everything they say.
Frankly, there are more in your posts I could describe. But among the logical fallacies is one known as overexplanation. Kind of intellectual overkill and a big brother to mansplaining and whitesplaining. I've said enough.
I am an atheist. I am disgusted by the way we are treating Julian Assange. I am ashamed to be an American. We are the monsters.
In middle age, I became an agnostic but before that I went sometimes to the church and I wished that someone had delivered a sermon like this. It would have not changed my perception of theology but I'm sure the world would have been quite different from what is now. Thank you, Mr. Hedges
Holy cow is this a hard hitting piece! EXCELLENT!
Thank you again, Chris, for coming to Norway and delivering such a powerful and inspirational sermon.
Wow. I have given up on metaphysics in favor of humanism, but that resonates. Thank you, Chris. You are also a wild man prophet shouting apropos warnings in the wilderness. I hope you find peace and satisfaction in your selfless efforts for humanity.
Great sermon, Chris!! I wish I could have been there to hear it.
The way you go through the dynamics of Assange's persecution is sublime.
The American Empire is collapsing and our corporate masters are desperate to stop anyone who challenges or questions the approved narrative. Right now the collapse is moving kinda slowly, but like so many existential issues that start out slowly, it can get really fast, really quickly.
Y'all stay safe out there.
Your voice is so important on every level..in all dimensions
🫸🫷
I was hoping someone would compare Julian's situation to Jesus Christ without it sounding absurd. This article is outstanding and historic, a truly great work. Thank you.
The truth has never seemed so clear and yet so difficult to bear and act upon.
It is difficult to explain American history to Americans.
Jefferson assembled The American Bible: The Life and Moral of Jesus of Nazareth in 1820.
He was my age in 1820 when 70 was very very old.
Jefferson said every generation deserves its own constitution.
Jefferson didn't believe in magic.
Jefferson understood that God only believes in evolution.
I lived for a decade in Woodlawn Chicago where Bobby Rush defeated Barrack Obama because In 1776 Jefferson was a liberal extremist.
Obama is far too conservative.
"Perception is real in its consequences." Voltaire
I am 75 and just as autistic as I was when I was five but the Quebec I was born in was not the Quebec I now live in. Quebec evolved.
We went from the Padlock Laws
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Padlock_Law
to Bill 21 which promises Freedom from Religion
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Act_respecting_the_laicity_of_the_State
In America you call it the separation of church and state.
I subscribe to Quebec's Co-op of independent journalists. We are a small demographic of Latinos smaller than many of your largest states.
Quebec is a different culture and speaks a different language. In Quebec Bernie Sanders is a centrist maybe a wee bit on the right. In Quebec Churches and Corporation have no rights. They are pieces of paper not living things. Only life has rights in Quebec and human life begins at birth and ends with death.
A fetus is not a living human until it emerges from a womb and doctor assisted suicide is part of healthcare.
I trust my local daily to tell me what it sees. I trust Chris Hedges to tell me what he sees. I see what I see. "perception is real in its consequences." Voltaire
I remember a Quebec that was poor and largely illiterate but it looked like Latin America looks today.
Today we pity America when I grew up we were jealous of America.
We used to padlock libraries now we send our working class to university.
We call it Secular humanist liberal democracy.
We love the system but evolution is happening way to quickly and we need college grads who know how to clean hospital floors. Cleaning hospital floors is a middle class job and requires a middle class education and the job requires a middle class salary. Our Amazon workers can send their children to university pay a mortgage and feed their families.
Julian Assange is a hero in Quebec . He is welcome to live anywhere in Quebec and stay as long as he wants.
We even welcome the Clintons.
>We even welcome the Clintons.<
I suppose y'all would welcome anyone at all. :-)
You are very fortunate to live in such a culture. Here in the US our corporate masters are insisting we can't even talk about the kind of humanism Quebec seems to be practicing, and the Christians seem to have forgotten the Sermon on the Mount.
Costa Rica maybe the only secular humanist liberal democracy in the Americas. I often wonder if Montreal lost its baseball team because we are a secular state and a liberal democracy and very wealthy. When we were a European theocracy/plutocracy we were poor and illiterate. More importantly we went from hopelessness for a better future which I call conservatism to liberalism which is about the future.
Education up to post docs is affordable for everyone even uber drivers.
Hope is all that remains in Pandora's Jar and America bought conservative Snake oil.
I don't know about the Montreal team, but some other sports teams have changed locations because the city or state wouldn't give them the money they wanted to build a new stadium.
Very interesting about Costa Rica. I know very little about your country, but IIRC it's a good place for American ex-pats. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Higher education here has become a sinecure for administrators and managers. Ever since the MBA's started taking over the colleges and universities about 40 years ago, the increase in tuition is almost entirely due to increased salaries for the administrators rather than for the folks who do the actual teaching. Sad.
Stay safe out there.
Thanks John,
I live in Quebec not Costa Rica and we are incredibly wealthy after being run by tyrants for 400 years. Our Health, education and welfare is run by our local university and the universities are run by ethical philosophers.
In America where I lived for decades your hierarchy has always taught the you the working class could not run your society it was always thus long before Columbus it is called conservatism in Johnson's dictionary of the English Language 1755.
Jefferson believed all men are created equal and Ben Franklin was a peasant who never went to school. Franklin taught himself to read and write and believed in educating everyone . Franklin built public libraries and public schools. His writing made him a celebrity and millionaire. He even bought slaves and then one day on the road to Damascus he became an extreme abolitionist and today we call it rocket science but Franklin developed the storage battery.
In our democracy the government doesn't rule it serves. Our administrators administrate just like in corporate America but we the people are ownership not management.
Our society is run by ethical philosophers who are paid salaries to administer to our desires.
Institutions have no rights only the privilege we choose to grant them.
Churches, Corporations, NGOs and even the government has no rights we grant human beings and living things. Institutions are pieces of paper they are not people in Quebec. English speaking Canada has many of the same laws but Bill 21 says in Quebec the SEPARATION BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE IS INVIOLATE.
Inviolate In Quebec keeping church and state separate is a sacred trust
The only guarantee of Freedom of Religion is Freedom from religion.
The American constitution is violation of the commandment against serving false idols. Jefferson wanted a new constitution written for every generation. In Quebec if the constitution no longer is deemed appropriate it is discarded.
In 1776 they believed a lot of stuff we now know is nonsense.
In Canada CORPORATIONS ARE PIECES OF PAPER THEY ARE NOT PEOPLE.
I am an old citizen but when I go to court the court is there to serve me as its boss not its slave. Both the defense and the prosecution are there to serve truth and justice and are not competitors but allies in the search for truth and justice.
In Quebec the constitution is a piece of paper. It is an instruction manual and assembly instructions not orders from the Almighty.
We are a secular Humanist liberal democracy that borders an Empire.. Our only defense is speaking a language that isn't NEWSPEAK.
There is no room for cars in downtown Montreal it was built for horses not suburbs.
I love watching baseball but when our Quebec Prime Minister said ROMAN CATHOLISM WASN'T ALL BAD MANY OF US CALLED FOR HIS RESIGNATION. iN QUEBEC RELIGION IS KEPT IN THE CLOSET SO PEOPLE CAN ENJOY THE SUNLIGHT.
Thank you, Moe, for the broader explanation. It's all to logical for the US to accept. The corporations are just too powerful now.
I remember Al Wilson singing the snake long before the Donald claimed the lyrics as his own.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULx9k2QkL94
"Jefferson didn't believe in magic." --Moe
Wrong, Moe.
For Jefferson, slavery was magic; particularly if the enslaved bore children. He actually referred to this magic originally referenced in Aesops Fable #Aesop's Fable 87: The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs (origin approx 600 B.C.)--an ancient greek fable Jefferson was surely familiar with. He is quoted in a letter from Elizabeth Trist to Catharine Wistar Bache (Dec.28,1810) as giving advice to a relative against selling slaves by saying "it wou'd never do to destroy the goose". In fact, Jefferson wrote to President George Washington as early as 1792 on his infamous "4% " slavery investment calculation. He wrote "I allow nothing for losses by death, but, on the contrary, shall presently take credit four per cent, per annum, for their increase over and above keeping up their own numbers". Indeed, Henry Wiencek writes in his book on Jefferson titled "Master of the Mountain" that "The words Jefferson used-"their increase"-became magic words".
Thank you WWII for the inspiration.
I am a grandfather of Americans. When you grow up in privilege your empathy is diminished by your privilege. It is the way it was and the way it is.
Jefferson wrote or assembled his American Bible in 1820. The Life and Moral of Jesus of Nazareth. He was a former president not a student of The College of William and Mary and the Toleraration Act of 1689.
'Toleration is not the message of Jesus of Nazareth.
The fact you never grow up doesn't mean everybody is Peter Pan.
I lived in Woodlawn for over a decade. I would walk through the campus of the University of Chicago and my dog would not join the other dogs in jumping in fountain in front of the law school. All the law students loved my dog and their professor Obama.
I always spoke to them as peers but they were children and didn't believe they would ever grow up.
These are your leaders. These have always been OUR leaders from the time we built the first cities.
Jefferson was a scientist not a lawyer. We never allow truth tellers to assume authority we prefer Never Neverlanders. Science is the study of EVOLUTION.
Quebec is governed by our ethical philosophers not our juvenile delinquents.
I grew up under laws that allowed the government to padlock Jewish libraries and union halls where if you wanted to go to heaven you listened to mommy and daddy and GOD.
Jefferson grew up by 1820 he already been Daddy and was leaving forever.
Jefferson was flawed as are we all. We believe lots things that ain't just what we would like them to be.
I only vote in Canada but my wife supported Obama. when he entered our politics. I would prefer a liberal but in America liberal is like being Satan incarnate. Obama is a neoliberal and as Canadian philosopher John Ralston Saul says neoliberalism is neither new nor liberal.. Obama is a conservative. You can't always get what you want but if you try sometimes you get what you need.
In case you are wondering I( am not college material I couldn't do public school but I love building libraries.
Thomas More wrote Utopia it means a place of the imagination.
In Montreal the Thomas More Institute is a liberal arts institute dedicated to life long learning.
In America the Thomas More Society is a organization of right wing Roman Catholic legal juvenile delinquents dedicated to life long childhood.
I know the University of Chicago it has some brilliant students and faculty and a heck of a lot of Peter Pans and his children that never grow up.
I am a Jew my father grew up in Poland. He went to Catholic High School he understood Peter Pan.
I know what the constitution means. I have Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language. Johnson was a conservative and was a leading intellectual of the council of Never Neverland.
The words used in the constitution have evolved and the constitution is an abomination in 2023.
Raskin and Obama are experts in the America's constitution and have not got the curiosity to understand the words. I like them both but I love children who refuse to grow up. I still love my dog he is buried in my backyard. He lived a an interesting life. He was an old dog when he died. We were playing frisbee and he was playing with the deer the day he died. I am over six foot and he was still catching frisbees well above my head.
We played frisbee every day but I was not 75.
My wife studied philosophy at The University of Chicago. She has a PhD
We are retired and spend our dotage studying philosophy and we spend more on books than we do on groceries and we have no mortgage and our pensions cover our expenses.
We the richest humans in history in Never NeverLand.
Our grandson went to the same School as Michelle Obama and I was a forced to attend the same English Protestant Schools as Kamala Harris and we are not English Protestants we are liberals.
We are liberals. Evolution is God's design for the universe.
My wife's expertise is training teachers not from "Christian" culture to understand their cultures are as valuable as those from Rome, san Francisco, Washington, Ottawa, Moscow or London.
I learned to write after we left Chicago and I am just starting to write for children. Children like Elon Musk and people with college degrees like Joseph Robinette Biden and Chris Hedges.
I studied scripture all my life it is allegory not reality.
Jefferson evolved he tried to build a better society. He wrote The Life and morals of Jesus of Nazareth and read and studied Torah and Koran. He didn't believe in stone tablets he knew they crumbled into dust. He called it The American Bible.
My muse was a PhD in education and a Buddhist monk he told me I needed to learn to write for children before he left this vale of tears.
Writing wasn't easy before I learned how to operate an autistic keyboard designed for 5 year olds.
Writing is still a Herculean task for me but it is what I most enjoy before I crumble into dust.
I was a professional photographer I didn't need to know how to write. I am an old man blind in one eye and adjusting to failing eyesight and learning what being human is all about.
My muse wrote about other cultures . He wrote about Aboriginal sweat lodges, Buddhism and Shaolin Temple and and revered ancient traditions.
He was not a neoliberal. He grew up in Toronto the most neoliberal place on the planet and needed to discover his own truth.
Absolutely awesome! And so very real...
Very powerful. Thank you for this
Thank-you, dear Christopher Hedges - for this speech in defence of my brave and incorruptible fellow countryman, Julian Assange as well as for all others who speak and illuminate the truth in the face of the abuse of power of those who rule - who rule not wisely nor with compassion but who rule to reap the profits of inhumanity and illegality - against the truth. I shall spread this far and wide...
Vote for Vivek... the only candidate promising to pardon Assange.
Vote for nobody because the system isn't reformable and the CIA would kill anyone like Vivek or even the Apartheid-lover RFK before they could set foot in the White House, let alone free Julian Assange. Don't waste your time on elections or fall for softhearted naïve reformers who think they can change the system through it, because it cannot be saved and it must be destroyed along with those who control it. The system's ability to direct the rebellious into ways of supporting the system, as well as in ways of working for it or making it more efficient, is its neatest trick.
If you want to help Assange, then your best bet is looking for anything you can do outside of a pointless election that can only result in yet another victory for the Demorepublican Party. Protest, especially any kind involving disobedience to the state or leading to civil and political disruption, is your best bet; the worse the disruption, the better. And if you want to be revolutionary, buy land or save to buy land and help your local community while preparing for societal collapse. What is needed is isolated self-sufficient communities that can survive the present technological Dark Age with the goal of trying to ensure, like the monastic communities of old, that everything is not lost to future generations. Having a family or working in a soup kitchen is more revolutionary than wasted time spent on US elections. Without such acts, nothing will matter and all present sacrifices made in the pursuit of truth will not appear to have accomplished anything, because if people don't rebel, only technological tyranny and complete domination awaits.
All you accomplish by voting is legitimising an illegitimate system while pretending you have done anything that results in meaningful change. Of course it's much easier to do than anything substantial.
Vivek and Trump are the only two outsiders without previous government experience. Well Trump has it now, but he is still fighting the establishment you rightly claim is the problem.
If Trump wins there will be a civil war... and it will be ugly but I suspect the people would prevail.
Seems letting the old Confederacy go might be great. Let their residents deal with the low wages, inferior education, and poor healthcare. Except that the poorest people, particularly BIPOC, could not afford to vote with their feet. And all Indian treaties within their states would be immediately null and void. Corporate interests would grab everything. Native peoples are who they are because of the land to which they are intimately connected; stripping that away entirely would be an irreparable horror.
...within a series of irreparable horrors.
That would be in addition to RFK jr and
Marianne Williamson.
And Cornell West.
Yes, absolutely Cornel West.
How about Cornel West?
Damn straight.
Hedges calls for "constant acts of mass civil disobedience..." He calls for "constant acts of social and political disruption". Really? What civil disobedience? What political disruption? The particulars are glaringly in omission. It appears he desperately wants to be a leader to free his friend, Julian Assange from Belmarsh prison, but he doesn't know how to lead. Leadership means organizing and calling for specific action. He does neither. Rather, he chooses to hide behind the safety of the religious cloak by staying on the safe side of the law that guarantees expression of religious freedom. Indeed, upon his shield he writes words of religious expression (indeed copied from many others) which involve no social disruption; no civil disobedience whatsoever. He safely writes "pick up the cross and bear its awful weight on our back". Whatever. We've heard you utter these words before. This was, at best, a better draft.
I can only surmise that Hedges prefers to make Julian Assange out to be a prophet so he can safely (and legally) hide behind religious ideology that keeps him legally protected in the U.S.--and obfuscates the issue. In shorts he wants to start a revolution on religious grounds when there are none to stand on. This is totally unnecessary and futile. To the contrary, I believe Julian Assange simply discovered illegal activity in an erstwhile civil society--and worked unflinchingly to expose it under the power of the Press. No prophet connotations were needed. This is a civil matter to be resolved civilly. Martin Luther King did this (with the civil right matters of his day) by organizing marches, promoting sit ins, etc. Boycotts and petitions have also been effective civil means of protest. Nonetheless, King did his part most effectively by being a leader on the street, not a preacher in the pulpit. I suggest Hedges start offering similar civil solutions in order to address Julian's illegal prosecution-- if he really wants to be similarly effective.
By the sound of it, you're just another soulless nihilist who wants to be told what to do because you're already dead from no belief. Try going to a protest or even reading about them before you act like others are doing nothing while asking questions like "what disruption?". You act like Hedges isn't active in street protest. Are you? And what have you done for Assange? Other than attack people doing way more than you are for not doing it the way you like while defending states ran by the worst mass murderers of history as being civil and reformable. You come across as yet another dime-a-dozen Internet know-it-all trying to tell others what's politically effective while having nothing to say, doing nothing useful, and believing in nothing. Yawn.
Read my two detailed refutations below. So whose bones have been picked clean?
That's a lot of words in response to a feigned yawn. Appears I've cut real close to the bone.
Yeah , he hid out in all those war zones he reported from. I save this for people like yourself, 97%er.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooWailmzEoQ
Leadership, Prophets, Vision, Organizing...for real.
Besides the implied narrow definitions of civil disobedience and political disruption, you've proclaimed that "leadership means organizing and calling for specific action." So then are you going to show us exactly what that means? Or remain just another sedentary critic?
Your words deny any role to angry artists and musicians calling for justice. Or to alternative philosophers and economists. Or journalists. Even mystics have a part; prior to any action is the vision of what could be.
You seem to misunderstand what "prophet" means theologically, which Hedges explained in detail. Prophets don't work well with established power; they speak the truth no matter the danger to themselves. Therefore it's not about being "civil"--meaning to be polite and to work within the established order. Consider instead the feminist adage that "well-behaved women seldom make history."
You may believe that MLK was best on the street, not as a preacher. But that ignores the actual history of how he did what he did. As well as the huge role of the Black churches regarding civil rights. Similarly, the overtly religious aspects of the original Populists and the Social Gospel movements, both of which produced real political reforms. Remember, too, the jeremiads of Eugene V. Debs: "Yes, I am my brother's keeper."
Debs is also dear to me for questioning the very notion of leadership. "Too long have the workers waited for some Moses to lead them out of bondage. I would not lead you even if I could. If you can be lead out you can be led back in again...there is nothing you can't do for yourselves." During the '60s, as blue collar (25+ years) and the grandkid of a Wobbly, I would snarl to dogmatic leftists that "vanguard of the working class" was about their sense of superiority, their doubt that we lessers could possibly run our own revolution.
In any event organizing, whether for labor, political campaigns, or civil rights,--all of which I've done--is complex. It's not merely about announcing some action at city center next weekend. it takes months, years, even decades. It starts where people are at and develops over time into relationships built on trust.
I believe the release of Julian Assange, from what I would call false imprisonment, would be a moot point if it is further developed over "decades". Even additional years might but yield the freedom of a corpse. Who said anything about announcing "some action at city center next weekend"...besides yourself? And how would you know if I am sedentary on the issue of Julian Assange? You wouldn't. Small minds yield small thoughts.
BTW, "angry artists and musicians" have not been denied a role in protest for justice under my definition of leadership. They're just as welcome as anyone to participate in any action that leads to the dropping of bogus charges against Julian Assange.
The Harm of Narrowness
You haven't refuted my points. Re-read my comments; they're based on your assertions about leadership. And about how you simply defined away any role for anything not "civil," including religious organizations.
Since you either didn't understand the implications of your own assertions or didn't like that I called you out on them, I'll be blunt. Your narrow approach isn't going to get Assange his freedom. Worse, since the case is of world-wide importance and will affect freedoms in the U.S. then all opposition needs to be figuring out how to organize for a long, protracted battle. So yeah, "decades." Fortunately for you, some of us have already put in the long years of such work.
If you believe Assange could be released immediately, please explain how. You're the one who defined leadership as "calling for specific action." Where? When? If I'm wrong about how complex organizing is and that it takes trust built over decades, please enlighten us. I'd sure prefer it be easy.
My comment on "sedentary" was meant to link what you seem to think Hedges is about to your belief anyone not acting immediately must be bad somehow. Logically that would include you--unless you can show us differently. That's also why my silly statement about "city center next weekend" because it makes obvious how specificity and immediacy aren't enough.
I included journalists and philosophers since I figured that would demonstrate why your narrow view of leadership not only isn't valid, it's harmful! Not only does it exclude their great contributions, it precludes taking them seriously.
That was also why I mentioned artists and musicians. You then double down down on the original error by proclaiming they're "welcome to participate." So then you really don't see anyone outside of your restrictions as doing anything related to "leadership."
Okay, big mind. Give us some big thoughts. Thoughts that translate into effective immediate actions. Which, if they do, prove my point that vital contributions come in a variety of forms.
It pretty obvious (not to just me, by apparently not to you) that Assange could be released immediately if the U.S. DoJ dropped any and all bogus charges they have levied against him. And you're right, your comments are silly.
Bottom line is that you seem committed to the illusionary idea Hedges spouts that Assange must be assigned the title of Prophet in order to get him freed from jail. What a waste of time and effort doing so, IMO. But it's your religious freedom to believe so...and it's not my responsibility to force you to believe otherwise. Attempting to do so is a pointless debate revolving around religious dogma rooted in a subjective belief systems that does not involve the rule of law. That is why Thomas Jefferson (and others) were adamant about the separation of church and state while drafting our U.S. Constitution*. To be sure, that does not deny ones right to religious freedom, but you won't find any legal argument predicated on an interpretation of The Bible. The human race has been there; done that. It didn't work. So, I'll end my discussion with you by reiterating the familiar saying -- "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make 'em drink."
Cheers friend!
*which legally governs civil society and has (wrongfully, IMO) kept Julian Assange behind bars in Belmarsh Prison. I further believe that a tangent effort to freeing Assange should be a concerted mass effort to repeal the U.S. 1917 Espionage Act. After that, a concerted mass effort to sunset the U.S. Patriot Act. But I digress.
Logical Fallacies: Q.E.D.
For my 2nd reply, I thought about listing logical fallacies, tactics used especially among right wingers, but indulged in by the center and left, too. Instead, I replied to you by careful argument and precise rebuttals, assuming it's best to take someone seriously on their own terms. That didn't work. So then a list of a few of the logical fallacies you've resorted to.
1.) An irrelevant conclusion, also known as missing the point, is actually one of the fallacies. Bluntly stated: How do you get the U.S. to drop the charges? So if that in reality has little to no chance, then my points about organizing and whom to involve are vital.
2.) Argument by assertion. Your opening comment is full of them--for example your definition of "leadership." I and others have already called you out on this.
3.) Red herring. To drag in unrelated issues so as to deflect from the weakness of an argument and/or to change the subject so to denigrate someone, like you did with Hedges. The part of your original comment, done again here, about religion. It's also a form of guilt by association.
4.) Straw man. Ignoring the best part of an opponent's argument; instead offering your own flimsy version of it and then arguing against that. Your whole diatribe on prophets sure fits. Which is why you ignored my rebuttal (as well as Hedges' extensive explanations) as to the actual meaning of the term. Another is denying any leadership role to MLK's ministry and claiming that he was merely good on civics.
5.) Appeal to the stone. Which means to dismiss another's point as absurd without demonstrating why. Even though in my 2nd comment I explained exactly why I said "city center next weekend" and explicitly called it purposefully "silly," you then open with "your comments are silly." I've expressed forcefully why I think your arguments are inadequate twice and now I'm doing so by formal logic. How about some consideration?
6.) Ad hominem. This one is really bad form--it's to attack the person rather than the argument. Another right wing trope, but also so commonly indulged in that it makes any online discussion nearly impossible. And your "small minds, small thoughts" to me is prime. So also your assertions about Hedge's lack of leadership and that "hide behind religious ideology." Doing ad hominem is to in effect argue that if the person is bad, then so is everything they say.
Frankly, there are more in your posts I could describe. But among the logical fallacies is one known as overexplanation. Kind of intellectual overkill and a big brother to mansplaining and whitesplaining. I've said enough.
"I am not an organizer." -- Chris Hedges
He'd be in jail if he were.
Most people have the capacity to organize...and, I doubt both sentiments.
You can watch R T dot com . His 2016 2017 shows our on there